Bahamian pleads not guilty in U.S. to hacking celebrities' emails

NEW YORK Jan 8 (Reuters) - A Bahamian man pleaded not
guilty on Friday to charges that he hacked into celebrities'
email accounts to steal unreleased movies and television
scripts, personal information and sexually explicit videos that
he then tried to sell.

Alonzo Knowles, who was arrested last month after allegedly
trying to sell an undercover agent 15 scripts for $80,000,
pleaded not guilty in Manhattan federal court to criminal
copyright infringement and identity theft charges.

He had also offered to sell a recently finished script for a
hip hop artist biopic, court papers said. The script was for
"All Eyez On Me," the upcoming biopic of Tupac Shakur, who died
in a 1996 shooting, the film's production company has
said.

In court, Clay Kaminsky, Knowles' lawyer, urged U.S.
District Judge Paul Engelmayer to allow his client to be
released on bail after spending nearly three weeks in jail
following his Dec. 21 arrest.

Engelmayer denied the request, saying the Bahamas resident
faced an estimated three to five years in prison if convicted,
which gives him a "compelling penal interest in fleeing."

According to court papers, Knowles, 23, maintained a list of
at least 130 celebrities' emails and phone numbers. His victims
included movie and TV actors, a casting director, a popular
singer-songwriter and a hip-hop artist, authorities say.

The investigation began in December, after a "popular radio
host" received an unsolicited offer from someone for scripts of
the upcoming season of a TV drama, according to court
papers.

The radio host, who like others in the case was not
identified in court papers by name, then contacted the show's
executive producer, leading to an investigation by the U.S.
Department of Homeland Security, authorities said.
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